


The Maiden and The Demon King

by virberos



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Alternative Universe - Demon King, Emotional Comfort, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff, Human Sacrifice, Love Confessions, NO DEATH
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:09:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26873452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/virberos/pseuds/virberos
Summary: Cassandra Sagefire, daughter of the patron saint of Eternis Brillia, is ‘sacrificed’ to the Demon King, a last-ditch effort to save the city from eternal damnation.It doesn’t work, but the demon king gets a pretty new consort from it.
Relationships: Dante (Devil May Cry)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 26





	The Maiden and The Demon King

If Cassandra had any words to say about her situation, it would probably be one of those outsider phrases. Specifically it would be _‘Well...fuck.’_

She was sitting quietly on a small grassy hill, surrounded by meat and offerings to the Demon King and torches to light the way. She herself was in a simple white dress, shackled down to stone weights to keep her from running away. A good mile away was her former hometown, Eternis Brillia, the place where the populace had no trouble throwing her to the proverbial wolves. Her hand rested on her chest, remembering the ritual they did. She could faintly feel a blooming scar in the skin, where they magically severed her connection to her ancestor, Deirdre. They ripped away Astra, a crime she couldn’t forgive, and left her here to die, whether by the elements or by the demons that would devour her and leave nothing but bones and blood and ruin. 

“Fuck them.” She growled into the night, staring up at the harvest moon as it began to rise. “Fuck them all! I hope they fucking choke on ashes of their homes burning from the demons!” She yelled, ignoring the tears streaming down her face. 

“Dang, that’s some hate right there.” A new voice, a male voice, spoke. She jerked up, seeing a handsome man standing at the edge of the ring. His silvery-blue eyes lazily looked around the ring, what was offered to the Demon King, before focusing on her. Cassandra noted his striking red coat, shining silver hair, particularly silly straps across his chest held by golden...clips? His clothes were oddly modern compared to what the people of her (old) home town wore. She scowled at him, wiping her eyes with her knuckles. 

“You looking to get eaten by demons?” She huffed. “If you don’t want to be a demon’s dinner, you better skedaddle back to your wife or husband or...whoever you’re with.” 

“My wife or husband?” He asked with a playful chuckle. “What makes you say that?”

“Cause you’re a looker, if you don’t mind the compliment. I’m sure you’ve had people jump on your bones with a face like that.”

“Awww, thanks sweetheart.” The stranger beamed at her. It was irritating. She let out a sigh and leaned against her knee. “So, demons huh?”

“Yeah. Demons. You know, getting sacrificed for the Demon King. The typical.” Cassandra shrugged. She winced from the scar on her sternum. “Fuck, my chest still hurts from what those fuckers did.”

“Who, the demons?” The stranger asked.

“No, my own people. I had a spirit weapon but they severed my connection to it. So I’m defenseless.” She sighed, lowering her head. “Couldn’t do shit to stop them. Can’t do shit now. So I’m...kinda just here. Waiting to get eaten, I guess. I can’t get out on my own, after all.” A quiet fell between her and the stranger. She expected him to walk away, heeding her warning about the demons, and leave her to her fate. She closed her eyes, focusing on the distant cricket-song and the soft breeze above her. 

A sudden warmth, where the stranger was, suddenly caught her attention. She jerked up, seeing a demon before her. The demon bore dark red, almost black scales. It tilted it’s head at her, the four horns framing his head almost like a crown. His four wings flared out behind him. She let out a yelp of surprise, scrambling back as far as she could. The shackles stopped her from leaving the fire ring with a harsh jangle. The demon watched her for a moment before laughing.

“What the fuck…?” She whispered. Shock quickly became a firm determination, trying to hide her fear. “If you’re going to kill me, make it quick and painless like you did with that other guy.” 

“ **_What makes you think I’m going to kill you?_ **” The demon purred, stepping into the ring of torches. He reached down to the shackles, effortlessly destroying the chains. She stared at him.

“Well, you’re a big scary demon and all. I thought you were going to eat me.” She explained. “I’d rather have it be a quick painless death than a long stretch of agony before I pass out from it all.” 

“ **_Well._ ** ” The demon hummed, picking her up. “ **_Good thing I’m not planning to hurt you._ **” She instinctively clung onto him before realizing who exactly she was clinging onto. 

“I...er...why?” She asked awkwardly.

“ **_Because I don’t do that. Even as a king._ ** ” He nuzzled her hair. “ **_I’m too nice. For the most part._ **” 

“Too nice you say-” She stopped. “W-Wait, you’re THE Demon King!?”

“ **_The one and only._ **” If he could grin, she was certain he would. 

“...then why approach me with a human glamour?” 

“ **_Because if I came to you like this_ ** ” He rolled his shoulders to emphasize himself. “ **_You’d panic and hurt yourself. And I don’t want that._ **” Cassandra frowned before carefully leaning onto him. 

“So...that ‘for the most part’...what does that mean?”

“ **_Well, the people that were supposed to protect you left you out here to die._ ** ” The demon king explained. “ **_Did your family try and stop them?_ **” 

“No. My mother died a couple years ago. Even then, she’d be too weak to stop them. My father gave the order to leave me out here to die.” Cassandra explained. She felt his body shake under her hands. 

“ **_...I’m taking you back to my place._ ** ” He murmured. “ **_I’m gonna keep you safe, I promise._ **” His wings flared out before he launched himself off the ground. Cassandra let out a shriek, clinging onto his scales. Soaring in the darkened sky, Cassandra closed her eyes and shivered as he flew. She didn’t know how much time had passed, clinging onto the demon king tightly. She didn’t dare look down, not until the demon king landed on the ground.

“...are...are we done flying now?” Cassandra murmured, shaking from the sudden flight. 

“We are.” His voice had changed, no longer warped from demonic energy. Cassandra looked up, finding herself in front of a small manor house. The now-human demon king carried her inside. To her surprise, she found the place warm and cozy. She expected something cold, a detached regality from the reality of the world. The demon king carried her through the manor, up a flight of stairs, and into an expansive bedroom suite. He laid her down on the bed. “Hungry?”

“For your name.” Cassandra sat up on the bed. The demon king laughed.

“Aside from that.” He leaned against the post of the bed. “The name’s Dante, by the way.” 

“Cassandra.” She replied, bowing her head a little. “And...er...what’s the local specialty?”

“Pizza!” Dante’s lips turned up into a wide grin. “With everything on top, except olives.” His hand stroked Cassandra’s blond hair, noting how short her hair was. “There’s clothes in that closet over there.” He jerked his head to the closet. “And bathroom’s behind that door.” He pointed to the door in question. “Just yell if you need stuff.” 

“Thank you Dante.” She looked down to the shackles still on her hands and wrists. The chains were broken but the iron remained. Dante winced at that and sat down next to her.

“Right, they need to be taken off.” He carefully took her arms. From an unseen pocket, he pulled out what looked to be a bobby pin. He began to carefully work at lockpicking the shackles off her wrists. After a few minutes of working at her wrists, Dante suddenly pulled away. He lifted up her delicate legs to get the shackles off her ankles. She noticed how carefully he took care of her legs, how he held them like glass, regarding her so carefully as the hard iron of the shackles fell onto the plush floor. As the last shackle fell, she noticed his eyes lingered on the areas where the shackles chafed her skin, from how she struggled and tried to free herself. 

“...they’ll need to be looked at.” He murmured, his hands tenderly rubbing the chafed skin. Cassandra stared at his hands, where soft skin met hardened hands and leather. They were the hands of someone who experienced hardship, so unlike her, formerly living in the lap of wealth as a noblewoman, a descendant of Deirdre. 

They were human. Just like her. 

After a few minutes of quiet, he stepped away to pick up the metal shackles. “I’ll get food sent up to you.” He said. “You should go relax. Treat yourself and all that.” 

“...thank you.” Cassandra murmured. “For not leaving me to die.” 

“What can I say?” Dante’s voice was lazy and casual but Cassandra wondered if it was a mask to hide his true face. “I see a pretty lady in distress, I gotta help.” He glanced at her from over his shoulder. “Stay as long as you want.” She felt as if something was left unsaid, something that lingered in the air. 

“...alright. Thank you.” 

* * *

Cassandra smoothed the scarlet lingerie dress, resting cutely on his bed. It had been a couple months since Dante had taken her in, saved her from death. She had settled in nicely in his manor but Dante was mostly absent (perhaps busy with razing Eternis Brillia. The thought of her former city, burning from demonfire, wasn’t as distressing as she expected it to be. Perhaps, already, she had detached herself as a citizen of a city who had no qualms with throwing her to demons to save themselves). She had only seen a few other faces in the manor: Trish, a friend of Dante’s and a demoness and Lucia, an artificial demon who was ‘gifted’ to Dante by Arius. From what Lucia told her, Arius promptly was slaughtered after the gifting, trying (and failing) to get Lucia to assassinate the demon king and allow Arius to rise up as the new king.

She mused that Dante’s kindness stretched to everyone. It was sweet, unexpectedly so. She expected demon kings to be all wrath and cruelty, taking without care about others. She wondered if Dante’s kindness was his strength, compared to other demon kings. Cassandra lazily played with a tassel on a pillow, listening out for the doorknob to twist and for Dante to arrive and indulge. 

The doorknob twisted, causing Cassandra to perk up. The door opened, revealing a tired Dante with his coat over his shoulder. He hung his coat on a coat rack before looking up, realizing that Cassandra was there. There was an awkward pause before Dante let out an amused laugh.

“Well well well, look who’s in my bed!” He walked over to the edge of the bed, all amusement and mirth. “What’s up, lightspark? Who are you waiting for?”

“You, actually.” Cassandra admitted. Dante raised an eyebrow. 

“Really? Little ole me?” He asked. “Well...mind answering a question for me? A simple yes or no question.” 

“Uh...sure.” 

“Are you dressed like this because you feel like you gotta repay me or because you actually want me?” Cassandra was caught off-guard by how serious his tone. She stared at him, the demon king’s arms crossed and his pose too casual for his question. 

“...I…” Cassandra stared at him, words lost in her throat. The lack of answer, paradoxically, proved to be all that Dante needed to hear. He sat down across from her.

“Look, you’re smoking hot. Especially in that, I’ll give that to you.” Dante said with an easy smile (but still guarded, in a way. As if he was hiding something). “But don’t feel like you have to take my dick to repay me for saving you. You can stay as long as you want, rent free.” His hand rested on her shoulder, giving it a rub. “Although I wouldn’t be adverse to some cuddling.” He winked at Cassandra.

“Uh…” Cassandra only stared at him. The demon king pulled back, ruffling her hair before stepping away. 

“I’ll go take a shower. You have plenty of time to think about it.” He said, cheerful once more as he walked away to bathe. Cassandra laid down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling of the four-post bed. It depicted a phoenix in flight with a blue sword in its beak. She frowned at the sight, wondering what was so special about a blue sword amongst the flaming red feathers. Her mind drifted to Dante, how easy-going yet guarded he was. Despite being here for about two months, she learned very little about Dante aside from he liked pizza and he was exceptionally kind (but fierce when angered, a very hard task to do in the first place apparently). 

But Cassandra had nowhere to go. She knew no one in Red Grave City aside from Dante and the few that stayed close to him. She curled up on the bed, waiting for the sound of falling water to fall silent. Her eyes fluttered closed, her mind still busy with everything he had done and the past that lingered just out of mind. 

The water fell silent. After a few minutes, she heard the door open. She didn’t move, listening to the footsteps of the demon king as he rounded the bed. Laying down in front of her, she felt his hand slide through her hair before he pulled the covers over them. He pulled her into his arms, resting perfectly chaste against her back.

“Night, lightspark.” Dante murmured into her hair. Cassandra shifted in his arms, burying her face into his collarbone. 

* * *

Cassandra hummed as she knelt down to pull out a freshly baked pizza from the oven. She had spent the last two weeks learning how to bake a pizza for Dante, another skill she picked up in her stay that was starting to become permanent. She could easily move out, whenever she wanted. She had picked up employable skills, she could easily start looking for apartments, and she was certain that Dante had done all the paperwork to make her look like an official citizen. Anytime she wanted. 

But she couldn’t. She just...couldn’t leave him. 

It wasn’t that she was being held against her will. Far from it, in fact! But she just had the desire to just...stay. The manor was like home to her. Eternis Brillia? Just a bad dream. Red Grave City was more of a home than Eternis Brillia (who she was certain was scorched earth at this point). And then there was the matter of Dante…

_Oh Dante_.

Cassandra wondered if this was love, as she set the pizza on the oven to cool. Most of the skills she had spent time learning, such as lockpicking, hand-making pizza, and sewing leather, were all because she had fallen in love with the demon king. No, he wasn’t _just_ the demon king. He made her laugh, offered her a place in his home without any expectation of payback, was attentive to her every word, and saved her from a terrible fate. He was Dante. And him being the demon king was just a title. He could be a peasant, a handy-man, anyone in the world, and she’d still fall in love with him because he was who he was: A funny, sweet, attentive gentleman. 

“Yep. Your girl Cass is in love.” She sighed, not talking to anyone in particular. 

“With who?” A familiar voice made her jump. She whipped around, seeing Dante casually stride into the kitchen. She noticed his coat, spotting it draped on a chair lazily. “Also, nice pizza.”

“Don’t touch it yet, it’s still cooling!” She gently scolded. “I don’t even know how it tastes either. It’s just cheese because...nice and easy for my first time.” She explained. Dante leaned over to look at the pizza. 

“So...how long did it take for you to make it?”

“Uh...it took me a couple weeks to actually learn how to make the pizza dough and get the ingredients and all that.” She waved her hand. “It actually took fifteen minutes to make everything and bake it. And it’s not quite done because it needs extra cheese.” She said, taking the fresh parmesan cheese and the cheese-grater to put extra cheese on the freshly baked pizza in the shape of a heart. She heard an amused hum from the demon king behind her as she set the cheese and cheese-grater on the counter. 

“Full of love? That’s so cute.” Dante purred, watching as the thin shreds of parmesan melted. He walked away from her to grab a pizza cutter from a drawer. “Shame we gotta cut that cute heart you made but I’m starving!” 

_‘For me, perhaps?’_ She thought as he swiftly cut the pizza up into slices. Placing the pizza cutter aside, Dante took a slice and ate it quickly. He licked his lips.

“A bit plain but good for a first try.” Dante said cheerfully. “Thanks Cass.”

“You’re welcome.” Cassandra nodded, leaning back against the counter. Dante took another slice and finished it just as fast as he finished the first. 

“So, who’s the lucky guy? Or gal?” He asked. “We can invite them over tomorrow! Have a nice party and all that.” Cassandra didn’t meet Dante’s eyes. How could she say it? Last she tried, Dante wasn’t interested. But hiding it wouldn’t help them in the long run. She took a breath and looked directly into Dante’s (beautiful) blue eyes.

“You. You’re the lucky man.” She said. Dante stared at her quietly, she could feel his eyes search her for any sort of hesitation.

“And it’s not because you feel like you owe me?” He asked.

“No. Not this time.” She shook her head. “I could leave anytime I want, right? But...I’ve been finding that I don’t want to. I want to stay. With you.” She stood there, waiting for Dante to take the first step forward. After a few minutes of silence, she lowered her head. Of course not. He didn’t feel the same way about her-

“That’s what I was waiting for.” He murmured. She felt his hand gently cup the side of her face, lifting up her head. She realized how close they were, able to see every detail of his handsome face. “I gotta admit, I...I really wanted to have you as mine. But I didn’t want you to think you _had_ to be mine because I saved your life or because I’m the demon king. I wanted you to like me for...me.” There was something so vulnerable about the confession that made him so... _human_.

She had all but forgotten he was the demon king. She was so used to him being exactly who he was that the fact that he was also the king of demons was a fact that just...faded into the background. Her hands gently took his face and pulled him down into a gentle kiss. He let out a pleased purr, leaning into the kiss before pulling back.

“I’m the luckiest man alive.” He murmured. 

“No, I think I am.” She replied with a smile. Dante laughed, his hands moving to give her a hug. 

“We’re both lucky to have found each other.” He conceded. “So! How about we finish that pizza and watch a movie together?”

“Is that...a date?” Cassandra asked. Dante shrugged.

“Well, if you want it to be.” He looked back. “We already have dinner.” 

“...I can make more pizzas, if you want.” He perked up at that.

“With toppings this time?”

“Whatever you want, big guy.” 

“Jackpot!” The grin on Dante’s face was the widest she had seen. Cassandra smiled and slipped out of his arms back to the counter to make another pizza, just the way he wanted it. 

Just for him.


End file.
